Full image geo-registration from an airborne platform for Wide Area Moving Imagery (WAMI) is currently a computationally intensive batch process that is conducted in post-mission processing. Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)'s batch processing model for the Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) Angel Fire program is an example of the state of the art. Another example of image geo-registration is made by a scene correlation module in the Precision Strike Suite for Special Operations Forces (PSS-SOF) but requires high bandwidth access to reference geo-registered imagery from an external database.
Image geo-registration requires that, for each and every image, all parts of that image must be assigned a geo-reference tied to some chosen reference coordinate frame along with an expected error measure consistent with the statistical uncertainty of that geo-reference. For imagery captured by a passive monocular Electro-Optical/Infrared (EO/IR) sensor, the challenge involved in geo-registration is that the landmarks seen in the physical scenery cannot be instantaneously geo-located, but can be geo-located only when combined with information from imagery taken from a different point of view of the same landmarks.
Consequently, it would be advantageous if an apparatus existed that is suitable for real-time geo-location and geo-registration.